Newsletter ArchiveSUBJECT:eCommerce Tips Welcome to The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter. Back in May, (http://inter800.com/news800/archive/index.html) we talked about the moratorium on Internet sales tax. Last week several news sources, like my local newspaper and The USA Today, stated a deal had been reached to keep the current Internet taxation moratorium alive until 2006. These reports appear to be premature. Robert MacMillan, in an article for Newsbytes, reported that Senate staffers are refuting the claims made in those reports; you can find his article at: http://www.newsbytes.com/news/01/166855.html With eCommerce an important part of most company’s online business strategy, the issue of Internet sales tax is one of which you need to make sure and express your point of view to your representatives. This week George Paul has put together some tips on making eCommerce more successful in your web site. According to Neilsen/NetRatings nearly half of the US adult population have made a purchase online. That's 81.2% of all adults with web access. I think it is safe to say that eCommerce has "hit mainstream". If you are selling your product online and have not experienced success, I would take a look at the following areas (in order): 1) Traffic. Are people visiting your site? If no, build traffic to your web site by acquiring a readily identifiable, easily recognizable domain name and advertising it (Web, TV, Radio, etc.). We've discussed this topic in several previous newsletters, so I'll gloss over it now. 2) Functionality. If people are visiting your site, but not ordering, inspect the overall functionality of your site. Does your site allow secure credit card orders? If you accept credit cards in the real world, the expense of accepting them via your web site would only be slightly higher. I would add this feature ASAP. If you need help, call or email me. Is it easy to place an order? Try this. Enlist a volunteer that has never seen your site and watch them as they attempt to place an order. Don't provide any guidance, simply observe. What you see may surprise you. Your web site may appear simple to operate TO YOU, because you are familiar with it (or maybe you created it). In this regard, here's a simple tip: Make the ORDER button big and easy to find. Remove clutter and distractions. Keep in mind; while banner ads may bring some modicum of benefit, mostly they are designed to send people AWAY from your web site. Hosting your business' web site on a free server that requires you to display their pop-up (or banner) ads will either send your customers away or annoy the hell out of them. Either way, it doesn't inspire customer loyalty. Avoid high shipping/handling charges. Some studies say 60% of customers abandon their shopping carts when they see the shipping charge. When determining your shipping fee, you should strive to break even or maybe even lose money, rather than lose the order. Also, do not hide your shipping charges. Dropping the shipping charge on an unsuspecting customer after they've filled in their credit card info and such can not only kill the sale, but also leave the customer feeling angry and taken advantage of. In my own personal experiences, I am more likely to buy if there are NO shipping charges. Conversely, when I receive my order, I am far less likely to buy again if I can clearly see the cost of postage was way less than the shipping charge I got hit with. Use permission-based email to remind customers to buy from your site. Having a sign-up form for your company's newsletter is great way to gather your site's visitors' email addresses. Basically, a newsletter is an email containing useful information regarding your product, service or industry. The marketing-savvy Webmaster bundles this information with news about upcoming promotions, new inventory, holiday or seasonal sales or other suitable advertisements. These tips were derived from my own experiences with "bad" web sites. In all but one of these situations, I did not make the purchase (and regretted the one I did). If you have some pet peeves regarding e-commerce and how others practice it, send them to me via email (george@inter800.com). Likewise, if you have suggestions as to what makes an e-commerce site work for you, I'd love to hear those too. Thanks for taking to time to review our newsletter for this week. If you know of anyone that might benefit from receiving this newsletter, send them to ( http://www.inter800.com/news800/ ) where they can subscribe. If you have any thoughts on this subject or any ideas that could be helpful to the others in this group send them to me (Chuck Arning) at chuck@inter800.com All Contents Copyright ©1995-2001 The Internet 800 Directory Subscribe To The Newsletter: |